6209.0 - Labour Mobility, Australia, Feb 1998  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 30/07/1998   
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MEDIA RELEASE

July 30, 1998
Embargoed 11:30am (AEST)
79/98

Job mobility decreases - ABS

Of the 9,243,800 Australians aged 15-69 years who worked at some time during the year ending February 1998, 14 per cent (1,321,900) changed their job or business, or changed the locality of their workplace in that period, according to the results of a survey released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The proportion of people who were job mobile decreased 1.5 percentage points from the level of job mobility during the year ending February 1996. This is the first decrease in job mobility rates recorded in the survey since the year ending February 1992.

Some 80 per cent of those who were job mobile changed their employer or business at least once, while 20 per cent only changed the location of their work.

Other findings show:
  • job mobility was highest for those aged 20-24 years (25 per cent) and lowest for those aged 55-69 years (5 per cent);
  • job mobility was similar for those with post-school qualifications (15 per cent) and those without post-school qualifications (14 per cent);
  • those who had family members living in the same household were less job mobile than those who did not live with other family members (13 per cent compared with 20 per cent);
  • job mobility was relatively high among Australian-born people (15 per cent) and those born overseas in main English speaking countries (17 per cent), compared to those born in other countries (10 per cent).
    Of the 8,418,700 people who were working in February 1998, 78 per cent had been in the same job for the entire year, 14 per cent had changed jobs during the year and 8 per cent had started their current job during the year but had no previous job during the year. Of the 1,156,100 people who had changed jobs during the year, 40 per cent had changed industry from previous to current job and 34 per cent had changed occupation from previous to current job.

    Of the 1,981,200 people who ceased a job during the year ending February 1998, 64 per cent voluntarily left their jobs, compared with 65 per cent in 1996 and 61 per cent in 1994. A further 21 per cent lost their jobs due to retrenchment (compared with 20 per cent in 1996 and 24 per cent in 1994), and 15 per cent ceased their jobs for other reasons.

    Details are found in Labour Mobility, Australia, February 1998 (cat. no. 6209.0) available from ABS Bookshops. A Summary of Findings from this publication is also avalaible from this site.